Small businesses snap up downtown Calgary offices

Posted :
December 12, 2017

Soaring vacancy rates and plunging leasing costs in Calgary’s downtown office market have opened the door for many companies to set up shop in the core – an opportunity they would not have had when the city’s economy was booming.

“It’s not that you’re not able to (move downtown). It’s that when oil was at $100 (per barrel), it was a bad business decision to try and compete with the oil companies for the space. It’s not like you couldn’t physically afford it. It became disproportionate from a business standpoint,” says Timothy O’Hara, who with partner Louise Campbell, moved their law firm office from the Beltline in late August to just a few blocks north across the railway tracks into the heart of the city.